Spatiotemporal Distribution and Trend Analysis of Waterborne Diseases in Kalahandi District of Odisha, India

Abstract

Background: For several decades, the Kalahandi district of Odisha, India has been designated as a place of poverty, disease, starvation and death. The occurrence and resurgence of water-borne diseases in Kalahandi is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the district. Material and Method: Data on incidences of Acute Diarrhoeal Disease (ADD) and typhoid were collected from the District Health Office, Kalahandi, Odisha, for the annual incidence from 2015 to 2018. The study uses descriptive epidemiological method to analyse the spatiotemporal trend of two major waterborne diseases, ADD and typhoid that are predominantly found in the blocks of the district. The growth rate of these diseases has also been calculated to examine the growth of cases in each block. Result: We have found that the distribution of both diseases is highly uneven at the block level. Diarrhoea is found to be prevalent in all the blocks whereas typhoid is concentrated in a few blocks only. Spatially we found that the blocks lying in the central zone of the district are the hotspots for diarrhoea. Typhoid is highly dominant in the district headquarter Bhawanipatna and northern block Madanpur Rampur. The result also reveals that the cases of diarrhoea are declining and typhoid is increasing in the blocks. Conclusion: There are several underlying causes for the uneven distribution of these diseases, like undernutrition of children, contamination of water, overexploitation of groundwater, low percentages of villages covered with rural drinking water, and poor health infrastructure prevailing in the district.